Memory of a Time Traveler
by leavenodoubt
Summary: After eleven years, Link returns home and finds Zelda. But time has a way of catching up with him, and taking things back just when he thinks he has them for good. Post MM Link/Zelda
1. Chapter 1

**Hey guys. So I was super bored tonight and just had this idea kicking around in the old cranium. Both of my other stories are like right down to the nitty gritty right now and it's pretty stressful. So I just needed to do something to get my mind off of them but still working. Also it's 2 AM so this is what I got.**

**Don't know if I'll continue with this, but maybe if I get enough love and reviews and whatnot I might? I guess only time will tell! Kind of veers off from the traditional tale but I guess that'll only really be obvious if I continue... Anyways, let me know :)**

**Much love,**

**Leavenodoubt**

* * *

It had been eleven years since he'd stepped foot in this land. Eleven years, nearly to the day.

Here he was once called a hero, but not anymore.

Here he once knew the names of people in town, and they knew his. But now if he saw their faces, he wasn't sure if he would recognize them, be able to recall.

There was a girl here, elusive like a bluebird in winter that knew him once. Her face was only a memory, and even that memory was of a different time. Sometimes he struggled to remember the exact color of her eyes, or the shape of her lips. There was no picture for him to remember her by, only a memory that wasn't even his. It was a memory that belonged to a boy that died long ago.

Still he thought of her. In his mind, her gold hair was in the sky, and she cried as she held his hand. Some days he could barely remember why she cried. If he thought hard, he could hear her voice, if only for her words, not the sound. He had lived through many days, more than he ought to have. But through them all he still remembered her. He at least could remember her name.

There were no leaves on the trees now. The last time he had seen this place it had been green and warm. Now it was cold, empty and quiet. Darkness comforted him on the way home, stars had watched over him. They were the only ones that had followed him to places he never wished to see again, and back. He had always hoped he would return here. But now it didn't feel real, it didn't feel quite the same as when he was a child leaving here for the first time.

"Is it you?"

He supposed he should have been startled, but all he felt was relief. He had been sitting in an empty courtyard for most of the night. He liked the stillness of it all, he liked the quiet. There was a pause, hesitating to face her for the fear of seeing her after all this time, he wondered if she would be the same. But he did, eyes cast downward for her to look upon him, though he couldn't quite bring himself to look upon her yet.

"Are you a ghost?... A spirit?" she asked, a tired ache breaking her words.

His lips twitched, shaking his head he finally looked up. She wasn't as he remembered, this woman was a different one than in the memory of that boy. But her eyes were the same. He felt a tremor in his chest as she drew nearer to him, slowly, one foot after the other. When she was close enough, he saw the moonlight reflected in the glimmer of her eyes, the tears in them.

She swallowed, crossing her arms over her chest to protect her from the night's breeze. Her white nightgown drifted at her bare feet. "Won't you touch me? Prove that you're real?" she asked in earnest quietly.

He held out his hand, waiting for her to break through that unseen barrier that had separated them for so long. She lifted hers, gingerly placing her smooth palm into his as a silent tear fell down her cheek. That was all he could bear as he brought her long, slender fingers to his cheek, a shuddering breath escaping his lips. He slipped her hand behind his neck, stepping closer to her to encircle her waist in his arms. "I watched from my window. I didn't think it would ever be you," she whispered, voice shaking with tears.

"I'm sorry," were the first words he spoke back to her, but that was the first thing he had wanted to say. It didn't begin to say what he thought could make up for her tears, that look on her face built up from years and years of waiting. "I'm sorry."

"You're not a dream?"

"No."

"I thought this might be."

This was the only thing that convinced him she wasn't a dream. When night fell and he began to wonder if any of it had really happened, if she had loved him in a different time or if she had only been a light at the end of a nightmare. He had lived through many nightmares.

He could feel her chest expand and then deflate as she relaxed into him. The shape of her body fit into his, he hadn't remembered the feeling of her until then. He tried to memorize it—it was like a habit; holding onto trivial things for fear of losing them. Time had taken from him again and again.

"You're real," she whispered, her warm breath against his ear. Time had even taken from him the sound of her whisper; nothing had ever sounded so pure.

"Things are so different," he murmured, his voice thick though he couldn't understand why there was a pain in his chest he could not diffuse, "I didn't know it had been so long."

She only pulled back for a moment, the pallor of her face glowing in the pale moonlight, the stardust flickering in her eyes, before closing her lips to his just once. She leaned her forehead against his chest. He was taller now than he was the last time she had kissed him. "Does it still feel the same?" she asked, and with her chest so close to his, he could feel her heart beating steadily, her body trembling.

He cupped her face in his hands, returning her lips to his the way he'd thought about for years, the way he'd only done in a different time that didn't belong to him anymore. Her supple lips were the same, felt the same, tasted the same. Her body moved the same way, hands touched the same way. She was gentle and lithe and at the same time fierce like a flame. She barely parted them from each other, her lips still grazing his, and her hot breath still mingling with his. He could feel her lips move against his as she spoke, "Does it still feel the same?"

"It feels better," he murmured, a pit in his stomach that he couldn't decide was either painful or pleasurable.

"Will you be gone by morning?" she asked hopelessly.

He shook his head, "I don't know."

"Then before then, would you tell me?"

His brow furrowed, that knot in his stomach turning into sickness. "Tell you what?"

She touched his swollen lip with her index finger, "How long has it been... ten years?"

"Longer," he answered almost immediately.

Her eyes caught his again, fire in his veins as she studied his face with those familiar blue eyes. "Tell me why it took you so long to come back."

He smoothed the hair that had blown across her face away, and he could see it in her eyes. He could see a hint of betrayal and hurt that he wished never to see. Maybe that was part of what kept him for so long, it was hard to think of a single reason, but he hated that pain he had caused. In that hurt he saw the little girl that had sent him off eleven years ago with an ocarina and a song. Since then he had almost always been alone. Travelling through time had taken every other person in his life from him, his own selfishness to reclaim them had lost him the only girl he'd been left with. "I can't."

"Why?" she asked, tears filling her eyes again. They changed when they were filled with tears... they were no longer familiar this way.

"If I tell you," he began hesitantly, folding her back into his arms, "I'll have to start this all over."

* * *

**But what does it mean? I guess the only way to find out is to favorite and review and all that snazzy business...**


	2. Chapter 2

**hahahahah yeah what's with writing this story at 2 AM? Guess I'm just trying to make things more confusing than they already are.**

* * *

A crease formed between her eyebrows, her voice aching when she finally spoke, "What do you mean? You can stay here, you're real—"

"Just let me stay until morning," he cut her off, a sick feeling crossing his face briefly. His composure returned between one sentence and the next, a deep breath smoothing out his features again though there was still the desperation in his eyes, "if tomorrow comes, I will tell you everything you want to know."

"If..." she repeated, a question lingering on her voice, "Doesn't tomorrow always come?"

"Not for me," he answered softly.

She shook her head, brows pulled together anxiously, "I don't understand."

"I know you don't," he murmured, pulling her into this shoulder just to hold her closer, to breathe in the smell of her, "I wish I didn't have to explain anything. I wish it was easier than this."

"Link," she breathed in desperation, it was the first time he'd heard his name on her lips in eleven years... for him, it had been even longer than that, "what are you running from?"

There was a space of hesitation between them as he paused. There were so many things he wanted to say, because there were so many things he was trying to escape, things that always had the tendency to catch up with him. But he was done with worry, especially the look on her face that begged to understand. "Nothing," he whispered, pulling her back into him and burying his lips in her soft hair, "I've been running too long, and I'm tired, and I don't want to think about it again until tomorrow morning."

Her eyes searched his face for a moment, trying to grasp hold of the mystery he held within him. "Okay," she finally said, the words hushed, "okay."

He tucked her head under his chin, and the way she fit felt familiar yet foreign. He was older than when he had held her in another time, he had grown taller, grown stronger, yet she still fit against him like she had then.

She slipped her hands into his, taking a step back to look up at him, "Come with me."

He followed her as they wound around courtyards and through empty hallways. The castle was still and quiet, the passages she led him through were devoid of guards. It was like she had anticipated his arrival for some time, slipping through the corridors that were hidden or forgotten. The stone walls were much the same as they were when he was a child, when he had come in and out without being noticed to see her. It was so odd to him how some things had changed so drastically, yet some things like stone and walls had barely changed at all. Even the smell of the air inside was the same, like oak and damp stone

"Here," she finally said, stopping in front of a quaint door he was certain wasn't hers. Her room had been further up when they were young, safely tucked away in a tower.

She turned the door knob, there wasn't even a lock on the door, and inside was a simple bed with white sheets, a shelf, and a plain wooden dresser. It could have been a servant's quarters, but the bare shelves led him to believe that no one had stayed here for some time.

"We can stay here without being noticed," she said, sitting down on the crisp white sheets and rumpling them slightly. The light from the window bathed her in a cold blue light, her white nightgown pooling around her. He dropped his bag that had burdened him for many miles, wandering closer to the girl on the bed. She caught his hand as he reached out to touch her face, pulling the glove gently off his hand. "Come lay down," she murmured.

It was such a relief to him to rest his head, nestling in beside her as he wrapped his arm around her waist. The palm of her hand rested against his cheek, thumb absentmindedly tracing circles. He instantly felt weightless, the constant searching and wandering had finally ended, and she was actually here beside him again.

"I thought you were dead," she said, her voice breaking, and as he opened his eyes again, he found there were tears pooled between her nose and her eye. They were nearly shut, but he could still see a sliver of the blue in her eyes cast downward. "All the rest gave up hope eventually, and they told me to stop waiting. But I couldn't for a long time."

"I'm sorry," he whispered, "I wanted to come back."

"Then why?" she asked, but it was an empty plea. She knew he wouldn't say, couldn't say.

"Zelda," he said softly, her name like a poison burning in his veins, "I know I can't expect this of you after all this time, but I need you to trust me."

"I trusted you once, a long time ago," she whispers, "and I want to again."

"Don't give up on me," he begged in a whisper.

She swallowed, a strained breath in interrupting the silence, "I was married."

A piercing pain cut through his chest, disbelief staying his breath. "When?"

"Three years ago now," she whispered, the ache in her voice palpable, "there was an influenza that swept the country nearly a year ago now... and then he was gone."

"I'm sorry," he whispered, "I'm so sorry."

"All I kept thinking when he died was that this couldn't be happening to me again. I couldn't be losing someone I loved all over again." There was a momentary pain in his chest as it sunk in. She had loved this man. If he was still alive, they would still be together, and he would have missed his chance. "And then I thought," she continued, "that if you came back to me, that I would be okay. I could live again if you came back."

He gently wiped a tear away from her face, the pad of his thumb smoothing away the left over moisture.

"And I started to hope again," she finished almost silently.

"I wish you never had to give up," he whispered, gently pressing a kiss to her forehead.

She curled in close to him, nestling into his warmth and letting the soft thrum of his heart against her cheek comfort her. Her skin was cool against his, and he wasn't sure if he was feverish, or if she was cold, but it was a welcome contrast; it was soothing away all the worry about what could happen to them.

When he opened his eyes again, morning light greeted him, a girl from a memory lost to sleep and curled into his side. Her hair spilled out on the white pillowcase, gold and soft and wild. But this was not just a memory like he had seen and felt many times before, the morning came to him like waking from a dream and trying to sort out what had been real, and what had been invented in subconsciousness. He waited, waited for her to move as if to prove that it had all been as he remembered, he waited for her to open her eyes and recognize him.

She felt him stir, as if sensing his unease in her sleep and moved in closer, guiding his arm to drape over her. Her skin was cold, just like before.

Heart racing, he rested his palm on her cheek, lifting her chin to look upon her. Her face was different than in those memories he so often relied upon for comfort, but the same as a memory made more recently. It was the same as it had been last night. "Hi," he said, his voice weak from sleep and rising emotion.

Her lips quirked into half a smile. "Hi," she said back, eyes still shut.

"I'm still here," he remarked softly, admiring the dimple on her cheek with his thumb, tracing the shadows cast by her lashes onto her cheekbone.

"I'm glad," she replied, turning her face into his hand and kissing his palm.

"I thought... I thought time might take me again," he murmured, begging silently for her to open her eyes, he just wanted to see them again.

"What do you mean?" she asked quietly, her mind still foggy from sleep, still trying to wake up.

He pulled her into his arms, his heart once hammering with excitement now began to be sick with dread. He didn't want to speak of it, but he had promised her. "Something happened after I left," he said, rolling onto his back and taking her with him, "I had to go back—"

He stopped abruptly, a weight heavy on his chest as he looked up. What had once been the whorls and knots in the wood of the roof, was now a dark sky scattered with stars. What had once been the bed beneath him was now a grassy field. There was an ache in his head, his stomach turning as he glanced down his body.

She was gone.

All he could do was lay there in muted pain. He supposed he shouldn't feel shocked, only an immense longing stole him.

Covering his face with his hands, he found a burning sensation on his palm, a wound that was still closing. He remembered getting it, he remembered slicing open his hand on a blade three years ago when he was eighteen. And yet, here it was, still hot and sore.

Time had picked him up and dropped him again, dropped him in a time and a place far away from that girl, the one with those eyes from his memories.

* * *

**Uh guys? I think something went wrong with this whole time travel business Link's so used to...**


End file.
